The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Hydrangea plant, botanically known as Hydrangea paniculata and hereinafter referred to by the name ‘Levana’.
The new Hydrangea plant is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in Brecht, Belgium. The objective of the breeding program was to develop new Hydrangea plants with strong stems, reliability and tolerant to pathogens and pests.
The new Hydrangea plant originated from an open-pollination in 1996 of Hydrangea paniculata ‘Barbara’, disclosed in U.S. Plant Pat. No. 13,606, as the female, or seed parent and an unknown selection of Hydrangea paniculata as the male, or pollen, parent. The new Hydrangea plant was discovered and selected by the Inventor in 2002 as a flowering plant within the progeny of the stated open-pollination in a controlled environment in Brecht, Belgium.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar by softwood cuttings in a controlled environment in Brecht, Belgium has shown that the unique features of this new Hydrangea plant are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations of asexual reproduction.